Powerslide FX [SNES / 3DO – Unreleased]

Powerslide FX [SNES / 3DO – Unreleased]

Power Slide is a cancelled game for the SNES and 3DO that had an “amazing” graphic for its time. The Super Nintendo version was going to be one of the few games to make use of the FX chip. It was being developed by Elite. Another racing game by the name Powerslide was eventually released for PC but it doesn’t seem to be connected to this game in any way.

The car handling physics in Powerslide were very advanced for the time, as were the visuals. Frame rate was less impressive unfortunately.

A playable demo of Powerslide SNES does exist and it was leaked thanks to Eludevisibility! The in-game screens dont look anywhere as nice as the original tech demo tough. The game would have probably been like Dirt Racer, the other SNES racing game by Elite, released in 1994.

Powerslide was basically a rally game, with real rally cars, Dirt Racer was a more arcade style game. The 3DO and PC versions of Powerslide were being developed by Maelstrom Games for Elite.

Thanks to SNES Central, MathUser,Celine and Lee for these images and info!

Images:

Videos:

What do you think about this unseen game? Give your vote!

(2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

Loading...

Would you like to add more info, screens or videos to this page?
Add a comment below!

I'm an Italian gamer with not enough free time to play as much as i'd like to and sadly not enough time to write about cancelled and beta games. Founder of Unseen64 in 2001, i'd like to sleep more than 5 hours a day, but i have to pay the bills. I'm currently working for various italian & international websites for a better User Experience & Search Engine Optimization, you can add me on Twitter, Last FM or contact me by email.

18 thoughts on “Powerslide FX [SNES / 3DO – Unreleased]”

Powerslide is a cancelled game for the SNES which was one of the few games to make use of the FX chip. It was being developed by Elite. It has gone under different names during development including Dirt Racers and Dune Buggies.

Another racing game by the name Powerslide was eventually released for PC but it doesn’t seem to be connected to this game in any way.

Thanks for the description MathUser! I’ll add it on the page, but i have a question. I have read the article on the scan that you have made, from where some of these screens came from, but to me it seemed like if Powerslide and Dirt Racers / Dune Buggies where 2 different games: am i wrong?

You are right, they looks almost the same, but in the 2 pages article text they are referred as 2 different games! Check page 154, they say: “Elite is in the process of developing such technology into two new games” and “the first of these games is called Powerslide”, while on page 155: “Elite’s second FX game is tentatively called Dirt Racers”.

If this is right, it could be the reason of the cancellation of Powerslide: 2 FX games were too expensive to produce. It seems that somehow Dirt Racer was released, but it looks different from the original “tech demo” on your scans:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TU-01Rx8Ff0

Thanks for the video Celine, i forgot about it :) Sadly the user has disabled the embedding feature from YT :( Probably the best thing is to update this article to add some info on the 3DO version along the SNES one

I worked at Elite (Motivetime) back in the mid 90’s. They were developing two SFX racing games internally. The lead one being PowerSlide with Lead Coder Rick Frankish This was still unfinished when I left. The car handling physics were very advanced for the time, as were the visuals. Frame rate was less impressive unfortunately.

The second title was Dirt Racer (lead by Chris Nash). This was completed. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_v15IXZcHw You can certainly download the ROM if you look around. I drove all the racing lines for the AI in that one!

Powerslide was basically a rally game, with real rally cars, Dirt Racer was a more arcade style game.

i wonder if all images shown here are from the snes version of powerslide or are only the above 10 images from the sne.s version,if the other 7 images bellow are NOT from the snes version,that will be a huge sissappointment,but whaatever i read,i got no clue. but i really hoe that all shown screenshots are from the snes version czz that will proof how really powerfull the superfx2 chip really was.

Edge Issue 7/April’94 had preview of the game, which had then been in development for 9 months, was nearly 50% finished, interviewd Richard Frankish and Trevor Williams (Both who i’ve found, sent emails to this morning via companies they now work for).

Main Graphics and simulation Code were produced on PC 1st as it was easier to do in C then convert it over to the SFX Chip.The early version Edge saw running was being done via the original SFX chip and whilst a little sluggish, was’nt any slower than Stunt Race FX which used the newer SFX chip, SNES version was said to be 15 FPS at the time of preview, but code would be moved to newer SFX chip and frame rate see a speed boost.

Team planned to apply a few texture maps to SNES version, but if it effected frame rate? they’d of been dropped.

Dirt Racer was to be the 2nd SFX Chip based SNES game by Elite, down for a 1995 release.Visually similar to Powerslide, but courses had a more rugged, chiselled look, cars would behave differently as well..

Update:Whilst i never heard a word from those i attempted to contact, there’s been countless rumour/speculation over the years concerning the supposed Atari Jaguar version.

Some claim it was never started, just planned, others claim it was in the hands of Telegames, but like other titles they were sat on was never finished due to Telegames stopping all development work on future Jaguar titles after sales of existing Jaguar titles were unsatisfactory (Pete Mortimer 1999/2000).

All Steve Wilcox (Elite) would say when asked about it on an RVG interview was that it ‘may well be residing on a disc in Elites office’.

Far too vague to really get an angle on.It may be, then it might not and if it is? what exactly is the code? test routines? actual game code? if so how far along? Alpha stage?.

Sadly it was an answer that said something and yet nothing at the same time.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Comment

Name *

Email *

Website

Notice: It seems you have Javascript disabled in your Browser. In order to submit a comment to this post, please write this code along with your comment: 4a59932642c7e05447c3983267a539f3

Find your unseen game:

Search

What do we do?

Unseen64 is an archive to preserve articles, screens and videos for cancelled, beta & unseen videogames. Every change and cut creates a different gaming experience: we would like to save some documents of this evolution for curiosity, historic and artistic preservation. We are a collective of gamers from all around the world, in our limited free time we do the best we can to remember these lost games. You can help too! All Unseen64 articles are published in good faith & fair use, if you find any errors or issues regarding some of them, just let us know.

Buy Games to Support U64:

Here are some games you can buy on Amazon: when we use affiliate links on Unseen64 we may receive a commission for the sale. For you is free, you don't pay anything more, but for us it helps a lot! Currently this is working for Amazon.com, Amazon.it and Amazon.co.uk :)

Unseen 64 Archive

If you want to help U64:

Unseen64 is an independent site. No money is generated from our work so we must pay each and every server bill ourselves. Thanks to your support we were able to rise enough donations to pay the server for this year! We are super happy :) Remaining donations are used to repay some of the time spent working on Unseen64 and set aside in a “preservation fund“, for emergency site expenses and other equipment that could help the archive: all expenses will be discussed with our patrons before to be used! For more details check: How does Unseen64 use Donations? If you want to donate some of your love, we accept one-off donations through PayPal / Credit Card and pledges on Patreon! You can just donate how much or little you want. Every cent is really appreciated and sent towards the U64 Archive. Thank you for even reading this :)